To Russia with Love

On May 8, 2013, I attended a presentation provided by Carol Brown (name changed to protect the innocent) to the Lake Superior Elders.  Most of what Carol told the group was positive.  She lived in Moscow for the first 35 years of her life and then she decided to come to the U.S. to study nursing.  She was in International marketing before she left Moscow.  Ms. Brown came to this country as a fiancée to a man she was already married to in Russia.  They remarried at the Justice of the Peace in the states.  Even though it was her choice to move to the states she still has a love affair with Russia and maintains an apartment in Moscow.  She takes her sons to visit Russia and her family every other year.  Funny she didn’t mention her husband traveling with her. 

The capital of Russia is Moscow which expands over 1,000 square kilometers.  The population of Russia is 142,905,200.  One U.S. dollar equals 30 rubles.  One ruble is divided into 100 kopecks. As far as religion:

5% Islam

1 % Catholic, Protestant, Judaism, and Buddhism

15% other religions

8% atheist 

Christmas falls on January 7^th with a weeklong celebration.  Russia just celebrated Easter.  Easter is celebrated at Passover at the first full moon after the spring equinox.  There was a discussion about Easter associated with the full moon.   

Education is free and when Ms. Brown attended it took 11 years to complete elementary and secondary education.  School starts on September 1^st of each year even it is a Sunday.  English is taught to all students as a second language. Girls wear dresses or uniforms.  The day would be started with the teacher being presented flowers.  There are 40 well established universities with professional degrees in medicine, English, International Law and Business Management.  Russia was ranked 8^th in higher education with over 100,000 foreign students. 

 Throughout history Russia was a monarchy.  In 1917 Russia joined the Soviet Union, USSR.  On December 12, 1991 Russia declared its independence.  Today, Russian Federation is the form of government, with the President serving as the supreme commander like our country.  The government consists of two chambers, the Federation Council and the State Duma with a Russian Assembly and Russian Parliament.  Duma was derived from the Russian word meaning to think. The Prime Minister is appointed by the President and confirmed by the State Duma. Ms. Brown described the government like when you put spiders in a jar. Lot’s of dissension. Sounds like what we have going on between the Democrats and Republicans. In Moscow there is what the U.S. would describe as the White House. 

During the 1990s the business in Russia was more privatized.  In 2011 Russia was the world’s leading oil producer surpassing Saudi Arabia.  Russia was second in the production of natural gas and coal. 

 

Ms. Brown informed us that the government granted all citizens no matter what the family income was a Dacha, which is a summer cottage.  These Dachas were placed in areas that were away from their family home as a vacation retreat. According to how I understand communism, it resembled a socialist or more egalitarian distribution of property.  That may not be all bad.  In this country we have such a misdistribution of property with only a few possessing most of the wealth.  Education is costly and we have to rely too much on foreign oil because we permit our citizens to decide where our oil can be drilled.  We have a lot of untapped resources in this country.